


It's Been a Long Long Time

by girlinstory



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Avengers: Endgame spoilers, Multi, endgame spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-26
Updated: 2019-04-26
Packaged: 2020-02-04 12:51:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18604885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/girlinstory/pseuds/girlinstory
Summary: Summary: Post final-scene fic for Avenger's: Endgame. This Summary will contain spoilers for Avenger's: Endgame.Based on this Tumblr post (of mine):That was Steve and Bucky’s song playing during the final scene of Endgame. You cannot tell me for one second that Steve didn’t save 1970′s Bucky from the sub-sub-basement of that Hydra facility, and he was about to cut in.





	1. Chapter 1

Steve and Peggy danced to the music, until one of them felt a tap on their shoulder.

"Mind if I cut in?" asked Bucky.

This Bucky still had a long road of recovery ahead, but he hadn't killed the Starks. (In fact, he and Steve were Tony's godfathers now that Howard knew they were friends of "Potts.") He hadn't shot Steve. (Although Steve accidentally shot him once during the rescue.) He hadn't been tortured for another forty years.

His hair got a lot of beatnik comments, as did their living arrangement, but Steve and Bucky were long past caring about what other people thought. Peggy never had to begin with.

"Please," she said. "We both keep trying to lead."

It was easier to let people see the picture of Peggy and not the one he knew was tucked underneath. It was easier to say "love of my life" than "loves of my life," and no one needed Steve's representation in that Post Snap world where people's private lives barely registered.

"I thought you said that was our song anyway," said Bucky. "The one playing the night we met again?"

When Steve left the future, his Bucky had been smiling. When his Bucky said, "I'll miss you, buddy," when Steve didn't say it back, they both knew exactly what Steve was going to do- what he could do now that his Bucky was safe.

Now Captain America- the new Captain America- needed his Sergeant.

Now Steve wasn't Captain America anymore, and this Bucky was also his Bucky, and Peggy was just as she'd always been, they were all growing old together in the time they always should have been.

"It was our song," said Steve. "Why do you think I put it on?"


	2. Chapter 2

Sam left with the shield and a dazed look on his face. Bucky sat down on the bench and huffed out a laugh. Steve knew why. He was the short one again.

“You ain’t mad, Buck?”

“How can I be?”

“I left you.”

“For five seconds.”

“You didn’t know I’d come back.”

“‘Course I did.”

“Now I’m old.”

“So am I, pal.”

“Well, I’m wrinkly.”

“You think I liked you for your looks, you got another thing comin’, pal,” said Bucky, with that same sad smile he had five seconds and forty years ago.

Leaving this Bucky was at once the hardest choice Steve had ever made and one of the easiest.

This Bucky was safe.

2012 Bucky would soon be safe, because Steve had lit a fire under America’s ass.

1970 Bucky needed his help. He was alone, held by Hydra, in a universe that Tony had diverted, Infinity Stone or not, by his conversation with Howard Stark.

He had spent less time with Hydra, so he had longer to live than this Bucky, but not as long as Steve, and Peggy was only human.

Bucky knew Steve would be back.

They had both been there when Shuri delivered the news. Bucky looked good for his age, but with all the time he’d spent out of cryo, he had been alive and unfrozen for a lot longer than Steve.

Until now.

Now they were both old men, and they both had ten or fifteen years left to live, together, till the end of the line.

“You won’t mind takin’ care of me?” Steve asked, and Bucky just laughed. 


End file.
